


Two-Way Player

by wearemany



Series: Rookies [6]
Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: 2013-2014 NHL Season, Cock Rings, Dom/sub, Los Angeles Kings, M/M, Manchester Monarchs, Open Relationships, Rope Bondage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-04
Updated: 2014-04-04
Packaged: 2018-01-18 02:55:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,181
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1412338
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wearemany/pseuds/wearemany
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>What's the point of sleeping with Mike Richards if you can't just say how you want him to fuck you?</i>
</p><p> </p><p>So I recently fell into a deep spiral of reading hockey gossip tumblrs and although reports on Kings organization players were few, there were two interesting if entirely unsubstantiated posts: Mike Richards is (allegedly) very good in bed, and Tanner Pearson is (allegedly) "into bondage." </p><p>Upon further consideration, neither of those allegations seemed all that unlikely.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Two-Way Player

**Author's Note:**

> I thought this Rookies 'verse was maybe one story, then three, but is apparently an ongoing thing throughout the '13-'14 season. Featuring veteran players from the LA Kings and rookies from its AHL affiliate, the Manchester Monarchs. I think these stories can stand alone as post-game pieces, though there's an overall season arc that's developed. In this case, the most relevant backstory is where it all began: [Young Buck](<a).
> 
> Massive credit to Sinsense for cleaning this up (not making it any less dirty, just easier to read). 
> 
> Obviously I made all this up. For the first time basically ever I actually considered locking it, so please don’t be the asshole who makes me wish I had, OK?

 

Tanner's phone buzzes right when Tyler hands him a beer.

_busy today?_

"Oh shit," Tanner says. The bottle slips a little through his fingers.

"What? What?" Tyler asks, because he's an impatient little fuck.

Tanner tucks the beer into the crook of his elbow so he can type.

_just hanging out with the boys_

Tyler says, "Is that—" and Tanner elbows him hard, right where he knows Toff's still got a nasty purpled bruise. Tyler curls into himself with a whine and Tanner quickly thumbs out another text.

_bored?_

Smiley face? No smiley face. No winking. Richie's not some random he met on Tinder. Fuck, his hands are shaking.

Waiting. He waits. Toff and Joner are bickering about what kind of pizza to order.

He drinks the beer slowly and  scrolls back up his messages. The only other time Richie's ever texted was to ask if he'd bring back Skittles during a vending machine snack run.

His phone vibrates.

_come over._

Tanner stands up, gives Tyler back the beer. "I gotta—"

"Man, _fuck_ you," Tyler says, kicking at Tanner's knee before he can jump out of reach.

Joner glances up from his own phone with a mild look of interest.

"Pears gets called up again," Tyler bitches. "Seriously, what do I have to do to get Richie to—"

Jones says, "Be someone else maybe?" And then, grabbing Tanner's elbow as he squeezes by, "Don't fall on his dick _too_ desperately, okay?"

Tanner's pretty sure he's gonna do whatever the fuck Richie wants and probably, no matter how embarrassing it is, still end up begging for more.

 

Richie answers the door in long black track shorts. That's all he's wearing—shorts and a bare chest and those tattoos and a low-grade smirk.

Richie's big dog pokes its head out and then plods away with a grunt. When Richie twists at the waist to let Tanner inside, his shorts pull tight across what has to be at least the beginnings of a hard-on, which means Tanner hasn't even really gotten in the goddamned door yet before he feels himself blush.

He follows the dog into the living room. On the flat screen, two women with fake tits are eating each other out and moaning like crying kittens. This is what Richie's doing on his day off, apparently. Watching girl-on-girl porn and making booty calls.

"You know I can't actually do that," Tanner says, nodding at the screen. "Are you sure you didn't dial the wrong number?"

Richie laughs, easy, relaxed. Maybe a little stoned. Tanner doesn't know what Richie really does on off days. "I have a girlfriend," he says.

"Uhh," Tanner says. "I know that." Maybe he's got this all wrong. Usually when a dude who already knows you're down to fuck texts you in the middle of the day for no reason, that's the reason.

"Don't worry about it," Richie says, waving his hand like a half-assed apology for a missed pass, like, _what can you do, sometimes people have girlfriends._ "Want a drink?"

"No?" Tanner didn't need a drink to sleep with Richie with the first time, and he definitely doesn't one to do it again. If that's what this is. He spent a good five years of jerking off to the idea of Mike Richards looking even remotely as hot and interested as he does right now. He's ready. Assuming he's there to do more than just watch porn together.

Richie sits down on the couch, leaning back into one corner. Tanner stands in front of him, back to the TV.

"Not into this kind of thing?" Richie asks, tilting his chin up at the screen. There's some shit-talking in his tone, but this is the kind Tanner knows how to handle.

"I've, uh, done that," he says.

Actually he lost his virginity to a pair of girls he met at a house party who turned out to be way more interested in each other, but there's only one part of that story anybody ever cares about.

Richie holds his eye for a second, then nods and turns off the TV. It's really quiet without all the fake orgasms. "So what are you into?"

Tanner's slept with 10 guys, including his linemates, and probably twice as many girls. He's tall and he plays hockey. He doesn't really see it, but that's often all it takes to get him into somebody's bed. One thing he's never been into is saying no to a sure thing.

Four of those people have been—he doesn't want to say _interesting_ , but it isn't about whether they were _good_. He remembers what they had in common. While everybody else out at bars was always looking to have their egos stroked, Tanner was following around the people who got in his face, all argumentative.

Maybe it's a side effect of that, or a coincidence, or maybe it's no accident that Richie took just enough time to make sure Tanner wanted to get fucked before taking over.

"I liked how you fucked me," he says, blunt, heart racing. He doesn't want to waste half the day again talking bullshit about mutual acquaintances back in Kitchener, easing their way into this.

Richie slumps down a little in the couch with a tight sigh and palms his dick.

"Come here," he says, so Tanner gets down on his knees. Richie reaches out to fist his hand in Tanner's hair, pulls his neck back a little and holds him like that. "You like when I tell you what to do?"

Tanner nods, or tries to, at least as much as he can move his head. His entire life is about people telling him what to do and him doing it. Of course he likes that.

"You like more than that?"

Tanner doesn't know what _more_ means to Richie but it doesn't matter, he'll probably do it.  He nods. Richie scratches lightly at Tanner's scalp.

"You have to say it, Pears."

Richie strokes his thumb up behind Tanner's ear, smooth and gentle and intoxicating. Tanner's dick is already pressing hard against the fly of his jeans.

Richie says, "You want me to—look, I'll say some things, you tell me if it's what you like. Okay?"

Tanner sways a little in Richie's hold and says, "I want you to tie me up."

What's the point of sleeping with Mike Richards if you can't just say how you want him to fuck you?

Richie tightens his grip, then lets go altogether, knuckles rubbing the base of Tanner's neck where his hair's trimmed short.

"That's good," he says, and Tanner feels good, feels like this was the right thing to do today instead of a ridiculous bad decision. "Like—handcuff you to the bed, or that Japanese bondage stuff or…"

"Just—" Tanner makes himself stop and actually think about it. "Restrained," he says.

He's not sure what the word even means but it fits in his mouth, settles down his spine.

The way Richie wrangled his body however he wanted was hot—but still. Being thrown around like that, being held down hard against the mattress like even Joner knew to do without Tanner having to tell him to—yeah, but. If he's being asked. He could take more.

"Restrained," Richie repeats back, and Tanner nods. Richie hums a little and squints, thinking. "I probably have some rope around here."

Tanner's mouth waters and he tries to swallow a gasp. Rope is—he hadn't really gotten that far, somehow, but the idea of it is—good. A lot of good.

Richie folds his hands over Tanner's shoulders, one thumb pressing sharply up into Tanner's adam's apple, and Tanner has to reach out and grab Richie's leg to keep from falling over.

"Go upstairs," Richie says, his face soft, voice firm. "Get undressed. Get on the bed." After a minute he presses Tanner back, just enough to get him going. "Go on," he says.

Tanner leaves his shoes at the foot of the stairs. He grabs onto the rail halfway up when he realizes his knees are shaking.

He's done this much before, been invited up to Richie's room. He knew then at least vaguely what was waiting for him on the other side. It's different this time, to strip off his clothes and sneak a look at himself in the mirror over the dresser and think about what happens next.  

Fucking Richie was not the kind of thing he really forgot about. Or stopped thinking about. Or avoided obsessing over even though he’s seen the guy nearly every day since except when he was sent back down to Manchester.

Even when he managed to joke around with Richie, to tease him or invite him back to join the guys—even if he played it cool, he always felt a little crazy around Richie, a little desperate. Darryl always says a rookie’s first job is to prove he’s not making anything worse and maybe then and only then he can get the chance to make it better, so Tanner’s been trying that out across the board.

He sits on the end of the bed facing the open door, feet flat on the floor, hands on his thighs, trying to settle under his skin and stop squirming. He trusts Richie, and not just that he won't hold any of this against him. He trusts Richie to be good at this the way he's good at everything else, quiet and focused and ready with the right word when it needs to be said.

Tanner stares down at his toes in the thick carpet. He can hear Richie downstairs, opening and closing what sounds like maybe a cabinet, telling the dog to go back to sleep, shutting a series of doors as he makes his way closer, the house growing quieter and more secluded and private.

Richie makes a little noise at the door, a damp grunt, and Tanner looks up. Richie holds out a neatly tied loop of black rope and says, "How's this?"

The one time Tanner sort of managed to suggest this before, the girl just tied his wrists to her headboard with a couple scarves.

"Looks good," he says, voice more even than he'd expected.

Richie hands him the coil anyway, like he expects Tanner to inspect it, sign off on it. It's slick, heavy nylon, and there's either a whole lot of it or not that much, depending on how it's going to be used. Tanner's not really sure how Richie's going to use it.

"Also," Richie says, squatting down to dig through the bottom dresser drawer. "I think..."

Tanner sets the rope on the bed next to him.

"Yup," Richie says as he stands back up. "Also, I forgot I had this."

He's holding a short fabric strip, maybe an inch wide and six or seven inches long, with a row of metal snaps all the way down it.

"It's a cock ring," Richie says after a minute, and Tanner flushes hot. His dick jumps. He's never seen one like that, or really seen one at all outside porn.

Richie hands it to him. The snaps are cool but not heavy in his palm. It's made of leather, he thinks, and given that he might come without being touched in the next minute or so anyway just from being naked on Richie's bed surrounded by all the ways Richie's planning to restrain him, it seems like it might be a good idea.

He says, "Do I put it on or do—should you do it?"

Richie smiles then, warm and reassuring, and Tanner feels a calm rush through him. He's not fucking this up too badly.

"I'll do it," Richie says, but he doesn't make a move towards Tanner at all.

He squares his shoulders instead, settles back on his heels like he's about to diagram a play.

"Look," he says. "I'm not—I'll use the rope, and I can be—rough, or whatever. But I'm not going to hit you hard or anything." He shakes his head a little. "We have a game on Thursday."

Tanner nods. He doesn't want to fuck that up at all.

"And I'm not going to ask if you're okay every five seconds. You want more, or less, or you want me to stop—you have to say so." Tanner nods again and Richie says, slowly, "Okay?"

"Okay," Tanner says. Richie wants him to say it. "I'll tell you, okay?"

Richie reaches down and pulls hard on Tanner's cock, tugging it up, kneeing Tanner's thighs apart as he does. Tanner presses his heels into the carpet, hard, sitting up straight. Richie takes the cock ring out of Tanner's tight grip and wraps it around Tanner's dick, below his balls, using both hands to snap it in place. He's almost in Tanner's lap. His shorts are cool and slinky against Tanner's legs.

"Good?" he asks, and Tanner nods, biting back a joke about how Richie wasn't going to keep asking him that. Richie trails his fingers gently under Tanner's balls, almost a tickle, and Tanner just gives up and moans loudly. Everything feels hotter and harder, from his kneecaps to his knuckles.

Richie bends in and kisses him, mouth wet, stubble scratching Tanner's chin. "You can't—you won't be able to come until you take it off."

"Until you take it off," Tanner says.

"Fuck," Richie mutters against his mouth. "Let's fucking do this."

He yanks Tanner up to his feet, spins and pushes him face-first onto the bed. His hand reaches over Tanner's head to grab the rope, and then all Tanner can see is the steel gray sheets, dark wood nightstands, a mountain of pillows. He closes his eyes.

Richie pulls both Tanner's arms in, holding his wrists tight at the center of his back, then loosens his grip, shifts a little and does it again. Like he's testing the angle, or the tension. The stretch feels good, noticeable but not painful. Tanner arches his chest a little, pushing his shoulders out, and Richie presses his wrists into the curve of his back, shoving Tanner's dick into the mattress.

"Stop it," Richie says sharply. He loops the rope around Tanner's left wrist, then his right, then back again. Tanner stops trying to visualize it in his head. Richie's movements are fast and sure, like he's taping up his stick for a game, up and down and around. When he's done Tanner can't move his arms at all.

"Get up," Richie says, "on your knees." Tanner fumbles a little to get his legs under him. "Just—move up the bed a little," Richie says, his hands steady on Tanner's hips as he shuffles forward. It's a little like skating when you've just had your bell rung, balance all fucked, trying not to fall backwards.

The bed dips as Richie climbs up behind him, his cock hard and smearing wetly against Tanner's back, legs in between Tanner's. Their feet still hang off the end of the bed, Richie's bony ankle knocking against Tanner's calf.

"Put your face back down," he says, but he helps, lowering Tanner's chest and shoulders smoothly until his forehead grazes the pillows.

Richie runs his hands along Tanner's ribs, over his ass, down the back of his thighs. He does it again, and again, and finally Tanner inhales and exhales through it, smooth and steady.

"Your boys ever do this for you?" Richie asks, as if somehow it's not obvious how overwhelmed Tanner is feeling, that this isn't so much more than he's ever gotten from anyone before.

Maybe it's not obvious. Maybe he's playing it _too_ cool. He just wants Richie to fuck him rough and reckless and unrelenting. Maybe Richie needs to know he's the first to do it how Tanner really wants.

He shakes his head, mumbles out a "no" against the cotton covers, damp where he's drooling from breathing with his mouth open, trying to keep enough air in his lungs. "Nobody," he says more clearly, and before he even registers that Richie has taken his hand off of him, it's coming down hard, a stinging smack across his ass.

He makes a noise, almost a yelp, and tries to smother it in the bed, but Richie must hear because he laughs a little. It's amused, not cruel.

He hits Tanner again, harder, and the stinging warmth spreads down his thighs. He jerks against the rope, immediately trying to bury the movement. He didn't mean to move. Richie spanks him twice more, quick and sharp, and Tanner holds himself as still as possible.

When Richie touches him again it's with just his fingers, wet with lube. No teasing, just a slow push in, and out, and in again.

This isn't anything new for Tanner, but the way he can't move around is. He can't stretch out toward the headboard, or get a hand on his own cock to get himself hard again—not that he needs to, it already feels like the hardest he's ever been in his life—or hurry things up by grabbing Richie's elbow and shoving himself down faster.

Richie sits back, pulling his fingers out, and when he leans forward again to reach for the condom, his cock nudges against Tanner's tied hands. Tanner wraps one palm around it, circling his fingers and managing to move them up and down once before Richie pushes his neck down hard, holds him there.

"Don't fuck around," he snaps, and it's enough like getting yelled at by a coach that Tanner's eyes water a little, stomach sinking with shame but also straight fucking desire, adrenaline hitting his nerves in a surge.

He wipes his face on the covers. "Sorry," he says, and he is. He wants to be good at this, be good for Richie. "I'm okay," he says, because Richie might not want to ask but he stopped anyway. Tanner's frustrated but, fuck, he doesn't want to stop.

The hand on his neck relaxes and curls gently around the front of his throat, pulls him up enough to stroke across his collarbone. "Just let me fuck you," Richie says in his ear, hot and desperate. Tanner is reminded suddenly of how it was the last time they fucked, how Richie was so controlled until he wasn't, until he was shaking with it.

Tanner says, "Please."

Richie holds him by his upper arms and bites between his shoulderblades, easing Tanner down again as he licks his way along Tanner's spine. Tanner keeps his hands curled around each other where he can't make any more trouble. The blankets that seem soft on his shoulders are excruciatingly coarse where his cock drags against them, a steady frustration. He catches himself trying to ease back, to stop himself from coming, and then remembers all over again that he can't even if he wants to.

Richie uses his tongue, a little, licking from the base of Tanner's cock back to his ass, and then his fingers dip in again, and then he pushes in his cock. He covers Tanner with his body, skin slick with sweat.

And then he starts talking again.

"Would you let me do this if your boys were here?" he asks and, fuck, Tanner can see it, isn't sure he'd be able to say no if Richie wanted it. "I bet they think they know how you are, right? But they don't. They don't know how fucking much you really want it, do they?"

Tanner moans but he keeps his shoulders relaxed and his hands slack. Sometimes he can feel Richie's stomach as he thrusts in, but Tanner's not going to touch, he won't do anything but lie there and let Richie fuck him. This is what he wanted, what he asked for.

"You'd probably like Jeff fucking you," Richie says. He bends down until his chin scrapes against Tanner's back, and fuck, _fuck_.

Tanner would have guessed about them, had all but assumed they must have been together at some point, but he never thought Richie would tell him like this. Of course Richie knows how people look at Jeff, what they think about the two of them. Of course he'd figure out how to use it to his advantage.

"He's lighter than he looks but his cock is fucking huge," Richie's saying, "and when he fucks you from behind it's—he's everywhere, all over you."

Tanner gasps and moans and—there's nothing he can say to that, _nothing_ , which is fine because Richie has hooked his arm around Tanner's neck, hauling him up and forcing Tanner's mouth into the crook of his elbow, letting him sit back on Richie's thighs as Richie fucks up into him.

"He'd fuck you if I told him to," Richie says. "I told him you were pretty good."

If Tanner could breathe he'd call bullshit, there's no way in the world Richie said that, no way. He's hallucinating now, maybe, lack of oxygen and overstimulation conspiring to give him even more of a good thing than he could have ever asked for.

He can't even keep up with what Richie's doing to his body. Richie fucks into Tanner shallow and then deeper again, fast and then slow, off-kilter and uneven. He slips a hand down to tug at Tanner's balls before brushing his fingers against the cock ring and then back up Tanner's hip, wandering around like the lazy fucking asshole he apparently is.

His arm falls down from Tanner's neck to around his waist, holding Tanner close against his chest, keeping Tanner balanced on his lap. Tanner sucks in a grateful deep breath, tilting his head back onto Richie's shoulder, but he still can't move much, and he can't come, and he definitely can't keep a high-pitched whine quiet.

He can't do anything but let Richie fuck him, let Richie do anything he wants.

Richie's voice is getting lower and rougher and quieter but Tanner can still hear every word, Richie's lips on his neck, his ear, his jaw. "You'd probably like it if I brought all those guys over, Jeff and Toff and Joner and—all of them—and let them fuck you like this, all pretty and tied up and fucking begging for it—"

Tanner whimpers "please, fuck, please" and Richie twists Tanner's mouth closer so they can kiss. Richie bites Tanner's lips as he thrusts up and comes.

"Oh my god," Tanner gasps, "Richie, _please_."

Richie's fingers are clumsy as he fumbles with the snaps on the cock ring. Tanner is so, so fucking sensitive right now he could scream, but then it's off and Richie's hand glides from the base of his dick up to the head and that's it, he's done.

He thinks maybe he yells as he falls back on his face, because when Richie pulls out, the groan that Tanner presses into the sheets feels ragged and raw. When Richie's untied the rope, sliding his hands down, fingers digging hard into the muscles, Tanner's shoulders suddenly ache worse than after the most brutal day of lifting weights.

Richie rubs an open palm down the middle of his back, smooth and steady gentle pressure from his neck down to his tailbone. It feels so fucking good.

Tanner says, "Thank you," and passes out.

 

He wakes himself up snoring, but thankfully he's alone. He's still on top of the covers, arms curled up to his chest, a light fuzzy blanket draped over his hips. There's a glass of water on the nightstand, sweating with condensation, and two bottles next to it: over-the-counter pain relief and the real stuff. The label on the prescription says it's from last December for Michael Richards, take as needed.

Tanner swallows two Motrin, stretches out on the bed like he's making snow angels and tries to locate a part of his body that doesn't hurt. His eyes feel okay. Just about every day he's played in the NHL has started like that, though, aching and bruised, and except for some added tightness through the shoulders he doesn't feel too much worse for the wear. He's only moderately embarrassed to remember how he got there.

The house is really quiet, so silent that Tanner doesn't even call out Richie's name. Maybe he's taken the dog on a walk.

When he gets up to piss, he finds a huge fluffy towel laid out across the sink, so he runs the shower hot and takes his time. There are three kinds of shampoo on the shelf. He picks the one that smells like mint.

There's a stack of clothes on the bed that weren't there when he got up. The shirts are all too small and his clothes are still in a neat pile on the floor, so he just puts his own stuff back on. Now he can hear Richie moving around downstairs.

Last time Tanner got dressed and made an excuse and left as quickly as possible. But they played together just fine all season, even after Richie found out just how fast he could get Tanner to his knees. There's no way to sneak out, so there's really no point in stalling.

Richie's at the stove, cooking. He turns and looks at Tanner. Tanner waves, then shoves his hand in his pocket. It's basically always impossible to feel cool when you're standing around with Richie or the other veterans. He should really be used to it by now.

Richie turns back to the food. "Hungry?" he asks, stirring pasta with pink sauce around in a pan. "I ate out the other night so I had double portions stacked up from the service."

He doesn't look up again and Tanner remembers—like it's a story somebody told him and not something he'd seen for himself dozens of times—how Richie is actually pretty quiet most of the time. Awkward, almost, especially if there's media around or too many strangers.

"Sure," he says, and pulls out a stool to sit at the bar.

He lets himself just look at Richie, look at how his back muscles move under the navy short-sleeved shirt he's wearing. How thick his thighs look in his cargo shorts. Still barefoot on the wood floor. He lets himself remember what it felt like to have the hair on those legs rubbing against his bare ass as Richie fucked up into him.

Richie side-eyes him, reaching for plates out of the cabinet. Tanner swallows and says, "So, uh, which food service do you use?"  

They sit around the kitchen and talk about the team nutritionist, and then they talk about laundry services, and then they talk about when Tanner might move out of the hotel and into his own place. Whether he should bother driving his car cross-country or pay someone to do it for him or just buy a new one. Mike doesn't suggest the most expensive solution to everything, but he's kind of casual about spending money to make things go smoother, which is maybe an easier call when you've got a contract his size for another decade.

It's helpful, actually. Little ideas about all the shit Tanner's had in the back of his mind as he let himself start to believe he might be sticking around L.A. for a while. Somehow it doesn't feel like he's jinxed his chances to make the roster permanently, just because he had an actual conversation about apartment leases and neighborhoods and hybrid electric SUVs. Richie makes it all sound like a matter of time instead of _maybe_.

"It's good to get used to something," Richie says, "even if you never really know how long it'll last." He bites at his lip and quirks his mouth sideways, like he's about to take it back because it accidentally sounded profound.

He stands up, gathers their plates and forks, and busies himself running soap and water into the pan, even though he just told Tanner the housekeeper is coming the next day and she always does the dishes, too. It's not weird between them, it's just—different, what feels like in a good way. Richie's not acting like he wants Tanner to hurry up and get lost.

"So," Tanner says. "You and Jeff?" Asking makes him feel like a rookie all over again, but there's never going to be a better time.

Richie does him the favor of not asking what he means, though all he answers is, "Me and Jeff are me and Jeff."

Tanner gets it, he thinks, at least a little—he knows what it's like to have everyone just see you as a package deal, even if with him it's three instead of two.

"And," Tanner says, "you have a girlfriend." He's not trying to be an asshole. He just doesn't understand how this works any more than he knows what it would take for him to live alone without accidentally starving himself.

Richie leans back against the fridge and crosses his arms. He nods, slow. He doesn't tell Tanner to shut up, though.

Tanner says, "And you hook up." He has no idea how much Richie hooks up, honestly, but he knows enough to know it's true and that he doesn't really want to know who else.

"That's not a question," Richie says.

Tanner watches Brownie sometimes in the dressing room after a game, Brownie or Kopi or even Doughty, each answering a dozen variations on the same question with calm cliches. It must be awful but they do it anyway, sweaty and exhausted and angry at themselves. And they're good at it.  

Richie might have the best hockey sense of anyone Tanner's been on the ice with, but even Tanner can tell he isn't the guy you want in front of a camera at those moments, not even when he has it easy in L.A. He always sounds like he's looking for a fight and maybe worried this time he'll get it.

Richie asks, "You ever done it like that before?"

Tanner's not going to ask what he means, either. "Uh, I thought it was pretty obvious I hadn't."

"You held your own," Richie says, and Tanner laughs without meaning to. He really didn't, is the thing. Richie, who was probably expecting a nice, uncomplicated afternoon hookup, somehow had rope and expertly tied him up and—Tanner barely managed to stay afloat.

Richie's smiling a little but his voice is serious when he says, "You have to be careful. You can't just go around asking somebody to do this kind of thing to you."

Tanner says, "I know that, I'm not stupid."

"Well," Richie says, impatient like he gets when he has to explain a play twice, "you asked—"

"I didn't—I didn't just ask _somebody_."

They stare at each other a while. Tanner's not going to look away first. He's a dumb kid but he's not that dumb.

Finally Richie says, "Everybody talks. And once you get a reputation, even if—you can't just get rid of it. Believe me."

Tanner's pretty sure half the OHL knows he lost his virginity in a threesome he only suggested on a dare. And he's heard his share of stories about Richie and Carts and co-eds just like everybody else. It was hot, honestly, just another part of his stupid crush to jerk off to. It never occurred to him to question if it was true. Or even if it was true, what it'd feel like to have everyone assume that's what kind of guy you are, when he knows Richie isn't some douchebag hookup.

Richie made him _dinner_. Tanner's hit with a rush of gratitude that Richie ran with it when he could have just shoved Tanner's head down on his dick. Then he remembers the last thing he said before falling asleep was _thank you_ and wants to go hide under the dining room table with the dog.

"Okay," he says. "I get it." He pushes back his stool. "I should probably—"

"You still want to see why it's worth paying for a good view?" Richie asks, running right over Tanner just like he would any guy in his way on the ice. He doesn't wait for an answer, either, heading to the back stairs like he expects Tanner to follow.

Which Tanner does.

The view is—ridiculous. He's getting used to the Pacific and how it all looks like a postcard, but there's something different about standing on the deck at a restaurant and knowing that this absurd spread of ocean belongs to someone you actually know.

"I don't think this comes standard with the entry-level contract," he says. Plus Richie's rooftop deck is huge, with couches and chairs and a bar. It's his second house and it's all this.

"You'll get there," Richie says. He sounds unconcerned, and not in the way Tanner's parents loyally reassure him he'll succeed. But he doesn't need to be convinced, and that, maybe more than the sex or the pasta or the fact that Richie called him over again in the first place—that kind of blows Tanner's mind.

"So you just—" He tries to say it slowly like it's not making his brain explode. "I just keep working and don't get caught and—"

Richie stops him with a light touch to his arm. "That's not what I'm saying."

He doesn't say anything more, though, so Tanner tries again. "I always—I've been telling myself we'd grow out of it, me and the guys, and it didn't really matter anyway. But you still have that. You have everything you want. You have a girlfriend and a—you have Jeff, too, and it's just—it's okay? Everybody's okay with it?"

"It's not everybody," Richie says. "We don't all—" He lets out a frustrated-sounding sigh, though he doesn't seem annoyed at Tanner as much as himself. "Look, you knew what you wanted to ask for. When I was—at your age, I had no—"

He sighs again, and Tanner feels like an asshole for not letting him off the hook when he clearly doesn't want to talk about it.

Richie takes a deep breath and says, "It wasn't some grand plan. If you want it, you figure it out."

Richie walks away then, heads right for the mini-fridge plugged in under the bar, comes back with two beers uncapped. He drinks his in two long swallows before Tanner's even taken a sip.

Tanner's not sure if he should apologize or say thanks for the life advice, so he drinks his beer.

"I didn't call the wrong number," Richie says. Tanner chokes, but just a little. Richie shrugs then, a little sheepish. "I promised Lindsey no other girls. Sometimes she wants to hear about other guys, sometimes she doesn't."

"Oh," Pearson says. He doesn't think he blushed this hard when they were fucking. He says, "Okay," and somehow that actually makes it okay, suddenly it's just not weird anymore. They did this thing, and neither of them actually lives in a vacuum, but they trust each other anyway.

He coughs one more time, takes another sip and says, "So have you ever had sex up here?"

Richie laughs, loud and long, and maybe he's blushing a little too under the two-day beard. "Not here," he says. "Up at the lake, though."

Tanner says, "Seems like a waste, yeah?"

Richie waits a long minute. Tanner finishes his beer. "Want another?" Richie asks, and Tanner shrugs. Why not. He helps himself to one of the chairs, too, settling back. He's still more tired than sore, if kind of tight through the shoulders. Too bad Richie doesn't have a hot tub.

"Can you put a hot tub on a roof like this?" he asks, and Richie shakes his head.

"My bedroom's under this," he says, like it's the worst idea he's ever heard. His loss. Tanner's beach house is going to have a hot tub on the roof.

He doesn't give Tanner his beer, though, just stands there facing him, blocking out the sun and staring at Tanner like he's—

Richie leans in close, but he doesn't go for Tanner, just grabs the cushion off the seat next to him. He drops it at Tanner's feet and kneels down. He settles his arms across Tanner's thighs.

"Take your cock out," he says, so Tanner does. "You think you can hold off a few minutes without being strapped in?" he asks. Tanner nods. Richie waits.

Tanner says, "Yes," and Richie licks a long, hot wet path up the underside of his cock.

"You need it that bad," Richie says, "and your boys can't figure it out—"

Tanner gasps.  Richie's stubble is sharp on his inner thighs. It hurts exactly the right amount.

"You come to me if you need to," Richie says, his hand tight around Tanner where the cock ring was fastened, breathing warm across the tip.

"I will," Tanner says. "I will, I swear—"

"Relax," Richie says. "Just enjoy that million-dollar view."

Tanner slides his hands gently into Richie's hair, soft curls sliding through his fingers. "I am," he says.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Come talk to me at [dazzlingheroes on Tumblr](http://dazzlingheroes.tumblr.com).


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